2011 Shann Memorial Lecture, presented by Dr Martin Parkinson PSM Secretary to the Treasury
Interesting talk. Dr Parkinson was a clear speaker and covered a lot of ground. I was interested in his perception of how Australians are experiencing the post-GFC climate and the income slip between the mining industry (up), manufacturing (down) and ‘regular people’ (not seeing the ‘up’). He was keen to talk about the flexibility in the Aussie economy that meant we’d weathered the GFC better than some countries (unemployment is apparently 5%) and he talked about the future and the increasing economic middle class in China and India (in terms of being potential future export markets).
His comments on environmental sustainability were quite simple, we’re not paying the right price for water and carbon and despite Australia contributing only 1.3% to global emissions (ranked 16th in 2008) we’re also reckless polluters per capita (ranked 11th in 2008). He said “if no one acts, we all lose”.
He also talked about social capital, about how people with strong communities volunteer more, how people with strong social networks have better health, how people with strong family networks receive better aged care (and are happier). This ties into something![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
transcendancing has been speaking to me about recently – measuring Return on (Social) Investment – how do we quantify something like this?
Interesting talk. Dr Parkinson was a clear speaker and covered a lot of ground. I was interested in his perception of how Australians are experiencing the post-GFC climate and the income slip between the mining industry (up), manufacturing (down) and ‘regular people’ (not seeing the ‘up’). He was keen to talk about the flexibility in the Aussie economy that meant we’d weathered the GFC better than some countries (unemployment is apparently 5%) and he talked about the future and the increasing economic middle class in China and India (in terms of being potential future export markets).
His comments on environmental sustainability were quite simple, we’re not paying the right price for water and carbon and despite Australia contributing only 1.3% to global emissions (ranked 16th in 2008) we’re also reckless polluters per capita (ranked 11th in 2008). He said “if no one acts, we all lose”.
He also talked about social capital, about how people with strong communities volunteer more, how people with strong social networks have better health, how people with strong family networks receive better aged care (and are happier). This ties into something
transcendancing has been speaking to me about recently – measuring Return on (Social) Investment – how do we quantify something like this?
